


Impressions of Moriyama Yoshitaka

by wontonto



Series: Moriyama Appreciation [1]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: .......maybe, BUT NOT FROM ME BC ALL I DO IS ANGST HIM, Gen, POV Switches Every Chapter, VERY brief mentions of kobori/moriyama sometime, am i going to do something like this for all of them???, and honestly kasamatsu is underappreciated too tho, and moriyama is severely underrated, but i just really love moriyama and i think he's a fascinating character so i just gotta, cause i think they v cute, he deserves love, i just really love all the kaijo kids okay, so are nakamura and hayakawa and kobori, the boy just needs appreciation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-13 10:15:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29151855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wontonto/pseuds/wontonto
Summary: Moriyama Yoshitaka is a bit of an enigma to many, even his teammates. He acts the part of a playboy, but he's most likely a virgin. He's very serious on the court, and off the court he's rather studious. He seems like he'd be a bit of a pushover, but he's really quite stubborn.Here within lies their first impressions of him, and how they came to love him as he is.
Series: Moriyama Appreciation [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2139858
Kudos: 3





	Impressions of Moriyama Yoshitaka

Takeuchi looked over his new first years carefully. He’d been the coach for nearly eight years at this point, and he was fairly confident in his ability to gauge their talent and abilities. He had three promising players; two looked more than ready to take on the crown of Kaijo, but there was one... he wasn’t sure about. 

He looked a little _too_ excited to be on the team, and although Takeuchi knew that some kids just love basketball, he couldn’t really get a read on this one. 

“Alright, boys, state your name and what position you play,” he said. “We’ll start with you.” He pointed at one of the promising ones, with steely blue eyes. 

“Yes, sir! My name is Kasamatsu Yukio, I play point guard.” 

His eyes narrowed. He already had a great point guard, but he’d heard about Kasamatsu. He was very talented and Kaijo was lucky to have acquired him. “Next.” 

“I’m Kobori Kouji and I play center!” the boy’s voice cracked a little bit and titters came from the others. Kobori’s face flushed a little bit, but he still stood tall. Takeuchi could see why he was a center; he looked very determined. 

“Next.” 

This was the one Takeuchi was a little unsure of. 

“I’m Moriyama Yoshitaka, sir! I play shooting guard!” 

He didn’t actually have a great shooting guard right now, so that made Takeuchi a little happy. His shooting guard and captain, although he did make a lot of his shots, his shooting average was a little lower than Takeuchi wanted it to be. And although he pushed his boys to the limits, he knew that sometimes it wasn’t enough. 

He could work with these three. They wouldn’t necessarily become regulars until maybe their second year if they were lucky, but he knew that they could become an even more formidable team with them. 

* * *

At least, that’s what he'd _thought._

“Moriyama, fix your form!” he shouted at his new shooting guard. 

It was over two months into the school year and the boy still had _the worst_ form. He’d just toss the ball towards the basket in hopes that it’d go in. That wasn’t going to fly on an elite team like Kaijo. 

“But coach, I’m on to something, I just know it!” Moriyama yelled back, a fire in his eyes. 

“Your shots haven’t been making it, or are you blind?!” Takeuchi growled. “Fix your damn form or you won’t get better!” 

“But coach –” 

“No buts, _fix it!”_

Takeuchi looked toward his other boys, who had been practicing their drills and his eyes wandered to Kasamatsu. He just knew that he’d be a strong captain for Kaijo his third year, and he was proud that he’d picked up such a strong point guard. 

He heard the ball bounce off the rim _once again,_ and turned to look at Moriyama pouting. His arms were splayed up like he’d thrown it in that strange way of his, and Takeuchi wanted to smack him. It wasn’t improving anything at all, and it was starting to get on his nerves how presumptuous the boy had been. 

Maybe he hadn’t even had previous experience in being a shooting guard. Maybe he just needed to find his footing in it or something. 

“Ojiro!” he called out to the captain, gesturing for the young man to come over. 

“What’s up, coach?” he asked, using his t-shirt to wipe off his sweat. Ojiro was a shooting guard as well, but he played better as point guard and sometimes the point guard would switch with him. 

“I want you to mentor Moriyama. His shooting form is terrible, and although he keeps saying that he’s onto something, I don’t think he is. Our best bet is to get him to use proper form. I’m sure he has potential to be a great shooting guard.” 

“Okay, coach,” Ojiro nodded. “But are you sure? Maybe he really could do something great with that weird form he’s trying to use.” 

Takeuchi shrugged. “If you can help him hone it, _maybe._ But for now try to convince him that proper form is better. I want to see how far he can go.” 

“Yes, coach.” 

Ojiro trotted over to where Moriyama was and started chatting with him. Takeuchi trusted Ojiro, so he turned back to the rest of his boys. 

“Get your arms up, Kominato! Fushima, what are you trying to do? That was a foul!” 

* * *

That night, he invited his former Japanese national teammates for drinks. He knew that Shirogane was coaching Rakuzan and had been for a while; they’d faced each other at nationals once or twice in the span of Takeuchi’s career. Nakatani had also recently become the coach of Shuutoku, which wasn’t surprising. Araki had gone on to coach Yosen, the last Takeuchi had heard. Aida wasn’t coaching any schools, but he’d become a personal trainer. The bastard Harasawa had been coaching at Touou Academy since before Takeuchi started at Kaijo. 

He was relieved that only Aida and Nakatani had accepted his invite to go drinking that night. 

They sat around the table at their regular bar, drinking the night away and he started complaining about his kids. 

“Listen, my new shooting guard is _terrible,”_ he slurred. 

“C’mon, he can’t be _that_ bad,” Aida rolled his eyes. 

“No, he _is!_ He just tosses the ball however he wants to and it hardly ever goes in!” 

“Does he not know proper shooting form?” Nakatani asked over the rim of his beer glass. 

“I told Ojiro to get him on it, but even with that one-on-one mentoring, Moriyama still _refuses_ to use a normal form!” Takeuchi was honestly fed up with Moriyama’s selfishness and a part of him just wanted to find another shooting guard. Maybe he could groom Kominato into a good shooting guard... 

“Why not just let him do it his way, though?” Aida shrugged. 

Takeuchi blinked. “What?” 

“He might be trying something new because he thinks it’ll work. Just let him keep trying until it does.” 

“But what if it doesn’t? Then he’ll just be wasting his three years of high school as a benchwarmer.” 

“And if he _does_ figure it out? Are you immediately going to put him on the starting roster?” Nakatani pointed out. 

Takeuchi sputtered and finished off his drink before stalking off to get another. 

He knew both of them were right and he should trust his boys, but he just wanted to see Moriyama succeed. And with how he was going, Takeuchi wasn’t sure he was going to. 

He sighed and decided that he’d tackle this headache the next week. Right now he should just enjoy drinking with his old friends. 

* * *

The following Monday, as Takeuchi walked past the gym, he heard a basketball bouncing. They didn’t have a scheduled morning practice, so he didn’t know why someone would be in there. He took a peek in without fully stepping into the gym so he didn’t disturb whoever was in there. 

“Dammit!! Why won’t you just go in _every time?!_ It’s not that hard, right?!” he heard Moriyama grumble to himself. 

Takeuchi blinked in surprise. First, he hadn’t thought it would be Moriyama. Second, Moriyama expected the ball to go in every time?! Even professionals didn’t have a hundred percent success rate! This kid was nuts! 

He lobbed the ball once more, and Takeuchi’s breath caught for a moment. It was guaranteed to go in, he knew it. 

The ball swished through the net and Moriyama let out a cry of delight. “Yes!!! That’s thirteen out of twenty!” 

That wasn’t a bad success rate, if Takeuchi was being honest. It was definitely better than what Moriyama had been shooting in practice. Perhaps he was using these personal morning trainings to get his form to work for him. 

Takeuchi smiled to himself as he walked away. Maybe Moriyama could become an incredible shooting guard yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _listen_ i love the kaijo boys more than anything i'm fjskladfjklafj. and it's Moriyama's birthday this month so i gotta shower him in love. 😤


End file.
